Medicare Advantage

Medicare Star Ratings 2026: What the Numbers Really Mean

FRIENDSWOOD, Texas — Every fall, just before Medicare's Annual Enrollment Period opens on October 15, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) publishes updated Star Ratings for Medicare Advantage and Part D plans. The 2026 ratings are landing now, and if you're shopping coverage in Friendswood this season, it helps to know what those stars actually measure — and what they don't.

What Star Ratings Are

Star Ratings are a quality scorecard CMS uses to grade Medicare Advantage (Part C) and stand-alone Part D drug plans. Plans are rated on a 1-to-5 scale, with 5 stars considered excellent and 1 star considered poor.

The ratings aren't a marketing tool or a popularity contest. They're a snapshot of how a plan performed on dozens of specific measures during a prior measurement year. CMS updates them once a year, and the new ratings are posted on Medicare.gov in October, in time for the Annual Enrollment Period (October 15 – December 7).

What the Stars Actually Measure

For Medicare Advantage plans that include drug coverage, CMS looks at around 40 separate quality measures. For stand-alone Part D plans, it's about a dozen. Broadly, the categories include:

• Staying healthy — whether members get recommended screenings, tests, and vaccines.
• Managing chronic conditions — how well the plan helps members with diabetes, heart disease, and other ongoing health issues.
• Member experience — survey results on how members rate their plan and their care.
• Member complaints and plan performance — how often members leave, file complaints, or have problems getting needed care.
• Customer service — how the plan handles appeals, calls, and questions.
• Drug safety and pricing accuracy — for plans with Part D, how accurately drug prices are posted and whether medications are prescribed safely.

In plain English: the stars are trying to measure whether a plan is actually doing its job for the people already enrolled in it.

Why the Timing Matters This Fall

Star Ratings publish in early October each year, and they matter to you for one simple reason: they're one of the few apples-to-apples quality signals available before you enroll or switch during AEP.

They can also affect what plans look like the following year. Higher-rated plans receive quality bonus payments from CMS, which can influence the benefits plans offer. And if a plan drops to a low rating for several years in a row, CMS can flag it or restrict enrollment.

What Star Ratings Don't Tell You

This is where a lot of shoppers get tripped up. Star Ratings are useful, but they are not a substitute for checking the details that affect you:

• They don't tell you whether your doctors or hospitals are in the plan's network.
• They don't tell you whether your specific medications are covered, or at what tier.
• They don't reflect 2026 benefit changes — the ratings are based on past performance.
• They don't account for your budget, your health, or where you live.

A higher-rated plan isn't automatically the right plan for you, and a lower-rated one isn't automatically wrong. The stars are one input, not the whole decision.

What's New for 2026 (Beyond the Ratings)

While you're comparing plans this fall, keep a few program-wide 2026 facts in mind — these apply no matter which plan you look at:

• The Part D out-of-pocket cap is $2,100 in 2026. Once your out-of-pocket drug spending hits that number, you pay $0 for covered drugs the rest of the year.
• The Part D deductible maximum is $615.
• The old coverage gap ("donut hole") is gone as of 2025 — Part D now has three phases instead of four.
• The Medicare Prescription Payment Plan lets you spread drug costs across monthly payments instead of paying large sums at the pharmacy counter.
• IRMAA — the income-related surcharge on Part B and Part D — kicks in above $109,000 in income for a single filer in 2026.

Friendswood and Galveston County

Friendswood straddles two counties, but the bulk of the city sits in Galveston County, and Medicare Advantage and Part D plan availability is set at the county level. That means the menu of plans a Friendswood resident sees on Medicare.gov depends on the county side of your address. When you use the Plan Finder, enter your full ZIP+4 so the tool pulls the right county's options — and the correct Star Ratings that go with them.